Wednesday, November 28, 2007

She was an artist in the general sense. More specifically she was a photographer. She loved taking pictures with friends when they made wild faces, at school when she thought the classroom had a certain aesthetic, in the park when the grass felt cool under her bare feet. She loved the limits the photo’s frame offered after it slid out the other side. It provided her with a sense of perspective on the things around her that she couldn’t ever fully understand. She loved the feeling of solidity that it gave her,the things in each shot existed outside of what she saw with her eyes, they were independent of her life. It gave them life. She loved photography.

She then also liked to organize the photos into albums in neat symmetrical patterns in a strictly chronological order. She liked to get out her clear blue ruler and measure the exact number of half-inches in from the sides in order to align the four photos on each page in the perfect place. She enjoyed the patience and diligence that went into this work and the feeling of self-accomplishment that followed. She enjoyed the hours she poured into these albums, adding captions and borders and pages of more photos. She did this when there were quiet moments alone, or when there were quiet moments in class, or when there were quiet moments at the park. She loved photography.

He hated her for her love. He only had one class with her maybe five times a week for maybe an hour and a half. Unless either was sick or he skipped to go smoke, then it was slightly less. But he hated her for those few hours. He would watch her from across the room, watched her mindlessly measuring and adjusting and re-measuring and pasting her photographs into her albums as their teacher hopelessly taught ethics. He hated the way she would only look down at her photos, not blinking for minutes at a time. He hated her self-absorption and the way her tongue would sometimes creep out from beneath her lips as she slowly pasted down a corner. He hated everyone else in the class for not hating her the way he did. He didn’t understand how no one could notice this girl slowly working her photographs into an album until the bell would ring day after day. His hate consumed those few hours a day five times a week, maybe less. But once in a while his hate would spill into the evenings and ruin his cigarettes. Or sometimes his hate would leak into the weekends and ruin his nights and sheets. And sometimes even after that his hate would surge through his mind and send electricity through his bones as he had sex or when he masturbated or when he day dreamed. Some days after school when he would light up his cigarette, breathe it in apprehensively, and say to no one in specific, “I’m gonna burn those fucking photos some day.”

And then on no particular cool October day he did. It was more of a sudden impulse than anything planned or thought out. She was sitting on a bench outside the school taking a photo of the trees becoming vibrantly bare when the hate boiled up in his throat. He grabbed the album from off the bench and flipped it open. He saw to a photograph of her painted toe nails in the nearly green grass lighted by summer sun, a photo of a merry-go-round with two young children smiling on it smiling widely, a photo of a sunset intensified by the deadly fires of the west, and a photo of the girl with an empty smile standing next to some friends with emptier eyes. His body flared with hate and then his lighter flared from butane and then the album flared with flames.

She didn’t put up a fight, she didn’t protest or even stand up, she hardly even blinked. She met his eyes and held them for a long moment with a passive stare, eyes glossy like a lens. The acrid smell of burned chemicals stung his eyes and sent tears streaming down his cheeks. He wanted her to feel something, to hurt her badly, he wanted to grab hard onto her cheeks and drive his thumbs deep into her eye sockets, to crush the glass lenses. But he just stared, letting the cool October breeze put out the little flames of the album and pushing his tears off their course. The girl raised her camera, clicked, and walked away.

Monday, November 26, 2007

She was an artist in the general sense. More specifically she was a photographer, or at least that’s what she thought of herself. She liked taking pictures with friends when they made wild faces, at school when she thought the classroom had a certain aesthetic, in the park when the grass felt cool under her feet. She liked the limits of the photo after it game out the other side. It gave her a sense of perspective on things she couldn’t ever fully appreciate. She liked the solidity that it gave her, that these things did exist and there was objective proof to this. She liked the feeling she got as she snapped each photograph, that what she was doing might someday be appreciate by someone else and they would know her. She liked photography. She then also liked to organize the photos into albums in neat symmetrical patterns in a strictly chronological order. She liked to get out her clear blue ruler and measure the exact number of half-inches in from the sides in order to align the four photos on each page in the perfect place. She enjoyed the patience and diligence that went into this work and the feeling of self-accomplishment that followed suit. She enjoyed pouring hours into these albums, adding captions and borders and pages of more photos. She enjoyed doing them when there were quiet moments alone, or when there were quiet moments in class, or when there were quiet moments at the park. She loved photography.

He hated her for her love. He only had one class with her maybe five times a week for maybe an hour and a half. Unless either was sick or he skipped, then it was slightly less. But he hated her for those few hours. He would watch her from across the room mindlessly measuring and adjusting and re-measuring and pasting her photographs into her albums as their teacher hopelessly taught ethics. He hated the way she would only look down at her albums and photos, not blinking for minutes at a time. He hated her self-absorption and the way her tongue would sometimes creep out from beneath her lips as she slowly pasted down a corner. He also hated how no one else hated her as much as he did. How no one could notice the quiet girl slowly pasting photographs into an album until the bell would ring day after day infuriated him. Then once in a while his hate would spill into the evenings and ruin his cigarettes. Then sometimes his hate would spill over into the weekends and ruin his nights. And even sometimes after that his hate would come up as he had sex or when he masturbated or when he day dreamed. Some days after school when he would light up his cigarette and breathe it in apprehensively he would say to no one in specific, “I’m gonna burn that fucker’s photos some day.”

And then one cool October day he did. It was more of a sudden impulse than anything planned or thought out. She was sitting on a bench outside the school taking a photo of the trees becoming vibrantly bare when he grabbed her album. He flipped it open to a day that featured a photograph of her painted toe nails in the almost green grass in the sunshine, a merry-go-round with two young children smiling on it, a sunset intensified by deadly fires of the west, and the girl with an empty smile standing next to some friends with empty eyes. His eyes flared with anger and then his lighter flared with butane and then the album flared with flames.

She didn’t put up a fight, she didn’t protest or even stand up, she hardly even blinked. She met his eyes and held them for a long while without really registering anything or sending any real message. He became wild at her indifference and began cursing loudly and tearing out pages of the album. The acrid smell of burning chemicals hurt his eyes and nostrils and served as a motivation to keep going. He wanted her to feel something, to hurt her badly, he wanted grab hard onto her cheeks and drive his thumbs hard into her eye sockets. But she just stared, and then after a while a cool October breeze put out the little flames. The girl took out her camera, snapped a photo, and walked away.

Monday, November 5, 2007

[ANTON wakes suddenly, breathing hard with a faint sharp noise in the background. He takes a moment to gather his wits and realize that he is in his own bed. He moves legs out from the covers but remains seated in bed. His eyes move towards a picture frame that he picks up and stares at it for a moment. He places it back down gently and begins to quickly put on his clothes and brush his hair down with his hands. ANTON walks out the door and into the main apartment]

ANTON

[Looking around]

Laura! You here?

JEFF

[Watching television]

Cmon, Anton, keep it down!

ANTON

Sorry… have you seen Laura?

JEFF

You barely ever say a thing until someone’s got a massive hangover. Just ridiculous.

ANTON

Sorry…

JEFF

Anyways, they’re probably still in Rob’s room. Well, that’s where I saw them go last night anyways.

ANTON

Oh…okay.

JEFF

You shoulda been out here last night Anton, it was ridiculous. Some kid got up on the roof and was tossing balloons filled with shaving cream over the ledge. Ha he must have hit about 5 people that were walking by. Then some guy tried to get with Jackie, Brett’s girlfriend ya know? Well anyways they ended up going out back and fighting. Brett wrecked the guy in about 20 seconds, I think he had to get stitches ha. The whole party didn’t die down till around 7 or 8 or whenever the sun came up today.

ANTON

Yeah, I heard… what time is it anyways?

JEFF

Like 5 or somethin… I don’t know. Oh man, also, last night this….

[Lights begin to fade and only a solo light remains on ANTON. His speaking is inner-monologue and much more confident than before.]

ANTON

The dream last night, it was so… beautiful. The gentle caress of the sunrise, the dull hiss of the breaking waves, the glassy sea tinted vibrant reds and oranges. The breeze moving across my skin like her finger’s used to. Salt saturating every mouthful of breath…

[Lights quickly go back to normal as ANTON is interrupted by the sudden opening of a door and the appearance of LAURA and ROB. ROB silently proceeds to sit next to JEFF on the couch. LAURA moves to the kitchen and starts to try and find a cup for coffee. ANTON moves towards LAURA]

ANTON

Hey…

LAURA

[Briefly looks at ANTON before continuing to try and find a cup]

ANTON

So, how was the party?

LAURA

How do we never have any clean coffee cups?

ANTON

Did you check up here…?

[ANTON reaches up to higher cupboard]

LAURA

[Yelling]

Rob! Wanna go grab some Starbucks?

ANTON

Yeah, here’s one up here, here you go.

Laura

[Yelling]

Nevermind!

[ANTON hands jar to LAURA who takes it without speaking and begins to pour coffee into cup]

ANTON

So Laura, I had this dream last night I wanna tell-

LAURA

[Patting herself searching for something]

Hey Rob! Where’s my cell phone at?

ROB

Why would I know where your phone is? Probably on the bed stand.

[LAURA rushes off back to the bedroom leaving ANTON in the kitchen. He begins to overhear ROB and JEFF talking]

ROB

[Whispered incoherently]

Dude last night I must’ve made out with at least 10 other girls, I was so drunk.

JEFF

[Whispered incoherently]

Oh nice, did you….ya know?

ROB

[Whispered incoherently]

Of course man, with Laura and then Katie too after Laura passed out in my room.

[All lights fade. When they are lifted it is a different scene. ANTON is asleep in his bed. The room is lit by warm colors glowing from the window. The room has a pile of dirty clothes at the foot of the bed, and book shelf with many poetry and psychology books. LAURA enters the room in a towel, her hair is still wet, and walks over to the bed. She sits down gently near his feet and smiles at him. ANTON wakes up slowly, becoming aware of her presence. He sleepily meets her gave and smiles, moving his hand out towards hers. He moves his hand up to her thigh— A sharp, stinging noise erupts from the scene. All lights fade suddenly.

Lights return to normal with ANTON back in kitchen. He is caught in a zoned-out stare at nothing in particular]

[LAURA re-enters the kitchen focusing on her cell phone, as if texting]

LAURA

[Holding phone up in air]

We never get any reception in this crappy apartment….

ANTON

Hey Laura…

LAURA

[Not looking up from phone and taking drink of coffee]

Hmm?

[Laura looks up at ANTON as the lights fade. A solo light remains upon ANTON]

ANTON

I had this dream last night, you know, like the ones I used to have last year and tell you about. I was on this, indescribable beach, and a few feet away from me I saw these flowers, these brilliant roses. When I moved towards them they started to emit these strange and lovely sounds, like hearing a love story in a language you will never understand. And I just felt compelled to keep moving towards them, they were pulling at my chest, pulling like-

[ANTON is interrupted by the crash of LAURA’s coffee cup smashing on the floor. The room is shaking and there is the low rumble followed by a piercing whistle of a passing train.]

LAURA

[Can’t hear at first over sound of train]

…….knocks everything down at 5:15 [bends to clean spill]

[The telephone is now noticed to be ringing. ROB turns up the volume of the TV in the other room. Phone rings several times]

[LAURA walks over to ROB and gives the phone to him, wrapping her arms around him from behind. ANTON sees this from the corner of his eye as he is cleaning.

ANTON

[To self]

…they were pulling like gravity.

[All lights fade. When they are lifted they are in the other room again. LAURA is sitting on the floor looking through a book near the bookcase. ANTON is lying on the bed reading a book as well. ANTON sets his book down and his gaze falls upon LAURA who is illuminated by golden lights. ANTON mouths something but there is no sound. LAURA looks up at him, sets her book down, and gets into bed next to ANTON, resting her head on his chest. A sharp, stinging noise sounds the moment they touch. All lights fade suddenly.

They return to normal with ANTON still crouched over the broken coffee cup. He finishes cleaning and throws the broken parts away.]

Well, these flowers, they kept changing colors. The colors would flash and vanish instantly and continuously. So many colors I had never seen before and they flowed out from these flowers like they were crying, their mourning spreading out across the sand. And they were growing too; vines flowed out in every direction, moving in and out of the soft dunes like crackling organic snakes. The vines created a wake of hundreds of more flowers like the first, all singing their exotic tones and seeping beauty. All of them kept pulling harder and harder at me until I became completely surrounded by them, and then in front of me, at the center of this orchard, at the center of this dream was the most beautiful sight, and that…

[Lights return to normal and ANTON is alone in the apartment. Everything is completely silent.]

ANTON

…was you, Laura.

[ANTON walks back into his room and sits on his bed, mirroring the way he awoke. He holds the picture frame in his hands, then places it face down back onto his bed stand. A piercing sharp noise sounds as the lights fade.]